


Back There

by stateofintegrity



Category: MASH (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-03
Updated: 2020-08-03
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:00:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25679263
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stateofintegrity/pseuds/stateofintegrity
Summary: Charles attempts to leave a wartime romance in Korea.
Relationships: Maxwell Klinger/Charles Emerson Winchester III
Comments: 4
Kudos: 9





	Back There

“You will call won’t you? Allow me to know you’re safe?”

_ Safe but never again whole _ , he thought. “ ‘Can we still be friends,’ you mean?” 

“Yes. Yes. It’s more than I’ve offered anyone else.”

But it wasn’t enough. “Sure, Major. Friends. Take care of yourself.”

“I can’t change who I am.”

_ You changed me, though. Who’s going to answer for that?  _

This was real, he wanted to tell him. True. And you knew it was the first time you moved inside of me. The first time you sighed in the dark. 

“I hope you’ll be happy,” he told him and meant it, but he feared he wouldn’t. 

“You will have a good life. You will be better off without me,” the Major promised. 

“You don’t get to tell me so.”

His mouth tasted like salt; he wept without seeming to notice. He let him make it to the door. “You tell me something before you go, though. Is there one single person back there in Boston who’s gonna fall at your feet?” He sobbed once, recovered. “Major, who’s gonna take care of you? Who’s gonna take the place of me?” 

The door opened, closed behind him for the very last time. “That’s what I thought,” he said to himself and hurt more for the figure hurrying away than he did for himself. 

***

When the operator asked if he would accept the call from Boston, Klinger startled them both with an impatient shout. “I don’t care about the charges! Take yes for an answer, will ya?” 

Although the voice that asked for Sergeant Maxwell Klinger (scaring him a bit because what if this was an army secretary? What if they wanted him back?) was accented - it wasn’t  _ his _ . “May I ask to whom I’m speaking?” he became formal in case this was connected to a job; he’d been shopping his designs around and had sold a few. 

“Honoria Evelyn Winchester.” 

“Holy hell.” He realized what he had said and went hot and cold all over. “I’m sorry, ma’am, please don’t hang up. I’m not high class but that’s no excuse,” 

Musical laughter cut him off. “No ap-ap-apologies necessary, Sergeant. I startled you and r-regrettably we have not met, so I hope this will s-serve as an introduction of sorts. I believe you s-served with my idiot brother in Korea.”

_ Served with, huh?  _ It hurt, but he barely let himself feel it or the sharper pain that came when he asked, “How is the Major?” 

“Ch-Charles is well,” she lied nimbly. “But I am embarking on a new career in the fall in Paris. I’m to serve as an editor for a ladies journal. I need a new wardrobe - something unique and head-turning. A friend sent me your s-sketches. Can I prevail upon you to design for me?”

“You could hire an actual known designer, probably from Paris. I can’t cheat you.”

“I have a v-very short time. Ch-Charles trusted you, so I trust you.” 

_ That  _ kept him listening, though, in truth Charles had trusted him only so far - not enough to  _ keep _ him. She laid out the benefits she could confer on him: the money, the stone cottage. She didn’t have to say the thing that won him, though: Charles would be nearby. The chance to breathe the same air as him again was worth leaving his beloved city one more time. 

“I would love to help you,” he said truthfully, “but I’ve only sold a few designs. You’re sure you wouldn’t rather have someone with a name? A reputation?” 

“I know b-both your reputation for kindness and f-fashion. That is enough for me.” 

To be trusted and valued for these two qualities was all he’d wanted, so he agreed and tried not to hope too hard. 

*** 

Five weeks later, Charles was actually home for dinner. He still dressed for it because such acts made him feel a part of civilization again, so Honoria met him in upholding the tradition (less because she cared about upper class symbols than because she loved fashion and the excuse to plan multiple outfits a day). The companionable moments passed slowly; when Charles dropped his glass, shattering fine crystal, it was as dramatic as the shelling fire under which he’d once worked. 

“Charles?” 

His gaze was fixed on something she couldn’t see. He seized her wrist - harder than he intended to - and turned it to examine an ornamented sleeve. “Charles? You’re fr-frightening me!” 

He looked on her with haunted eyes. “Those stitches…” 

“Yes?” Was this some sort of battlefield flashback? She had heard of such things but still naively believed that madness did not visit the upper echelons of society. 

“Who made this?” 

“Your friend. Sergeant Klinger.” 

The words seemed to strike him; his chair seemed pushed back as if by force. “I thought as much.”

“You recognize  _ stitches _ ? When did you become so v-very fas-fashion conscious?” 

She saw him try to come up with a lie and find nothing. “How did you know?”

“Your r-recorded letters. I c-could hear it in your voice. Y-you should have brought him here. Brought h-him  _ home _ .” 

“How was he?” He knew it was a new dress, knew they’d met recently. 

“As-ask him yourself.” 

“Come again?” 

“You n-never listen to me, d-darling. I n-need an entire wardrobe. For Paris. H-how  _ ever  _ did you imagine I was m-making that happen?” 

She had never seen him so pale and knew he longed to seek comfort in lecturing her. Though her stutter made fighting with him difficult, she had a lifetime of practice. “You w-want to tell me that I h-had no right. Ch-charles, I’m the one who has to look into your eyes every day. The g-ghosts there are n-not of the boys on who you op-operated, but of m-missed chances. With him.” 

“He’s here?” 

“In the cottage.” 

“That’s all I’m getting, is it?” 

“It’s f-far more than you d-deserve, you cad.” 

“Honoria, please.” 

“Y-you really need  _ me  _ to tell you how he is? He’s sweet and d-dear and b-broken hearted over you, that’s how. Fix it.” 

***

Though he had accepted Honoria’s offer, in part, because it afforded him the opportunity to keep an eye on the man he’d loved and lost, Klinger felt lost, himself, when Charles appeared at the door to the little stone house that had once housed a butler or a driver or other servants the Winchester clan had, in this modern age, dispensed with. 

“Major,” he said, formally, as if he hadn’t spent two years remaking those two syllables into something gentle and fond. 

Charles could not enter a space that was now Klinger’s- a space full of his things - so he asked the man to walk with him. They set out down the shore, falling into step together. 

“You have been here all this time and I did not know,” Charles said at last. “What have you been doing with yourself?”

“Sewing, obviously. I walk a lot. I read. Nori comes over sometimes in the evenings to play cards.”

“You said we were still friends.”

“Yeah. And you know I can’t be  _ just _ your friend, Major. All anyone would have to do is look at my face to see it all over me, how I feel about you.” 

“So you would have come and gone and never told me you were here?” 

“You told me to go.” 

“And if I asked you to return? If I said that I have never been so wrong? That I miss you so much that I cannot sleep? That when I think of you I forget to breathe? Max, I knew you were here because of  _ stitches  _ \- but no stitches have managed to hold my heart together since I told you goodbye.” 

“You’re saying I ruined you as a surgeon, Major?”

“I am saying you ruined me as a  _ living being. _ I am no good without you, so please come home and bring goodness back to my life.” 

“Home?”

“If you will live there it shall be. If not,” he shrugged at the idea of being exiled from his own life. When tears stole his voice, he let them. “Maxwell, that I do not deserve you, I have  _ always  _ known. That I was wrong to leave you back there, I learned very quickly. That you came here at all… I have to believe you will care if I tell you that no one is taking care of me and that no one could ever take your place.” 

Max took his hand, simple as that. “I never thought anyone could,” he said and they walked back the way they would walk through life: together.

End! 


End file.
